FDA fast-tracks treatment that uses polio virus to fight brain cancer

 

The Food and Drug Administration has given so-called "breakthrough" status to a treatment that uses the once-feared polio virus to target aggressive forms of brain cancer, in the hope of speeding it to market. 

The therapy, developed at Duke University, hopes to use the virus’ debilitating properties to help fight cancer instead of harming its host, CBS News reported Thursday. 

The experimental treatment was the brainchild of molecular biologist Matthias Gromeier. By removing a certain genetic sequence and replacing it with material from the common cold virus, the polio would not be able to cause the incapacitating symptoms that once afflicted President Franklin D. Roosevelt and numerous others because it would be unable to reproduce in normal cells.

However, the altered version of polio could still reproduce in cancer cells—therefore making the cancer susceptible to Lipscomb’s and other patients’ immune systems.

“All human cancers ... develop a shield of protective measures that make them invisible to this immune system,” Gromeier told CBS. “By infecting the tumor, we are actually removing this protective shield and enabling the immune system to attack."

While the altered polio virus initiates the fight against the cancer cells, its ability to alert the immune system to the trouble is what often finishes off the virus, the network reported.

Full article here: 

http://www.foxnews.com/health/2016/05/13/fda-gives-approval-to-using-polio-to-fight-terminal-brain-cancer.html 

In Cancer news...

 

Sean Parker Donates $250 Million to Launch Cancer Immunotherapy Institute

Silicon Valley billionaire Sean Parker will donate $250 million to launch a new institute aimed at developing more effective cancer treatments by fostering collaboration among leading researchers in the field. 

"Any breakthrough made at one center is immediately available to another center without any kind of IP (intellectual property) entanglements or bureaucracy," Parker, the co-founder of music-sharing website Napster and the first president of Facebook, told Reuters in an interview.

The new Parker Institute for Cancer Immunotherapy will focus on the emerging field of cancer immunotherapy, which harnesses the body's immune system to fight cancer cells. 

It will include over 40 laboratories and more than 300 researchers from six key cancer centers: New York's Memorial Sloan Kettering, Stanford Medicine, the University of California, Los Angeles, the University of California, San Francisco, Houston's University of Texas MD Anderson and the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia.

Recently approved drugs have helped some patients sustain remission. But those first-generation therapies do not work for everyone, and scientists are trying to understand how to make them more effective. 

"Very little progress has been made over the last several decades," Parker said, referring to cancer drug research. "Average life expectancy has only increased three to six months with some of these drugs that cost billions to develop." 

Parker said the current system of cancer drug development discouraged the kinds of risk-taking that could lead to a major breakthrough. 

The new institute "is paradigm shifting," said Dr. Jedd Wolchok, chief of the melanoma and immunotherapeutics unit at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center.

He said it would alleviate the need for scientists to secure grants, which he said took up at least 30 percent of his time, foster collaboration among accomplished scientists and provide access to the newest information processing and data technology. 

"I have no doubt this will allow us to make progress, and to make it much more quickly," Wolchok said.

More info: http://www.nbcnews.com/health/cancer/sean-parker-donates-250-million-launch-cancer-immunotherapy-institute-n555196

 

 

 

Throwback Thursday...

#tbt to the many Angel Games we went to. You had to keep your eye on Frank Lozoya, because he'd disappear for awhile then return with a free Angel T-shirt and a Sparkletts water subscription. All he had to do was sign up for a credit card. Haha. Fun times! Miss ya pal.

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Throwback Thursday!

Several years ago playing Mario Cart on the Wii with Frank, Jon, and Dan. Frank always stood close to the TV and would try to block us from seeing the screen. We were also never allowed to go on the "Rainbow Road" level, because he was scared of heights. Fun times.

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